Just a Thought . . .

Written by Arthur Railton, from the Vineyard Gazette of May 25, 1990:

Every town has one. Some have two, three or more. They are our most ignored public spaces. Except during a few days in May. They are our cemeteries. Quiet and restful, even in frenetic mid-summer they are sanctuaries. Not for birds, not for wildlife, but for humans, living and dead. Yet, except on Memorial Day, they are ignored.

Planting Trees

From the Vineyard Gazette editions of May, 1933:

A conservation army, numbering 219 men, will arrive on the Island today to take up the work of reforestation in the state reservation under the federal plan for relieving unemployment. This army is one that has been through the preliminary course of training at Camp Devens and will be in the charge of a captain and two lieutenants of the regular Army, besides a detail of military police.

From the Vineyard Gazette editions of May, 1983:

There is no true analogy between the migration of birds and the comings and goings of seasonal vacationers on Martha’s Vineyard, the regular ones, the ones who have been coming for years and years, yet in both cases there is a design, and maybe an appropriate relevance of the stars in the heavens. An unforgotten grandmother who owned a cottage on the Camp Ground in Oak Bluffs always planned her arrival to take place just after “the cold May storm.”

From the Vineyard Gazette editions of April, 1933:

Joe the Clam Eater

From the Vineyard Gazette editions of January, 1948

Not conquering perhaps, but a hero just the same, Joseph H. Silva returned this week to his home in Edgartown. He went west as the Vineyard’s champion clam-eater, seeking a prize as the nation’s capacity consumer. Mr. Silva has won local fame for his capacity for steamed clams, boiled clams, fried clams and just clams.